Delivering attachment for printing-presses.



APPLICATION I'ILED JUL ,1911. 1,01 7,999. 7 Patented Feb. 20, 1912.

' 2 SHEETS-SHEET 1.

J. M. PIERCE. DELIVERING ATTACHMENT FOR PRINTING PRESSES.

APPLICATION FILED JULY 24, 1911. 1,017,999. 9 Patented Feb.20, 1912.

2 SHEETS-SHEET 2.

O Q r JAMES M. PIERCE, OE DES lVIOINES, IOWA.

DELIVERING ATTACHMENT FOR PRINTING-PRESSES.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, JAMES M. PIERCE, a citizen of the United States, residing at Des Moines, in the county of Polk and State of Iowa, have invented a certain new and useful Delivering Attachment for Printing- Presses, of which the following is a specification.

My invention relates to that class of printing presses known as perfecting presses in which books or papers are printed, folded and stitched; and it relates more specifically to that class of presses in which two or more separate and distinct books or papers are thus printed, folded and stitched at the same time. In most presses of this kind now in general use, the separate and distinct books are all delivered to a common conveyer from which they are removed by the operator and separated by hand. I am however aware that somewhat complicated and expensive mechanism has been provided heretofore for the purpose of separating the two or more difierent and distinct books being printed by the press and for delivering them to two independent conveyers from which they may be taken by the operator after having been thus separated.

My object is to provide a device of simple, durable and inexpensive construction which may be used in the nature of an attachment and readily and easily applied to printing presses of the class before described that are provided with means for printing, folding and stitching two distinct books at the same time and which deliver all of the books thus completed to a single conveyer.

A further object is to provide a device of this kind in which the two separate sets of books are delivered to their respective conveyers all in the same position; that is to say, that the stitched edges of the books all extend downwardly and rest upon the conveyer for the convenience of the operator in handling same.

My invention consists in certain details, in the construction, arrangement and combination of the various parts of the device, whereby the objects contemplated are attained, as hereinafter more fully set forth, pointed out in my claims and illustrated in the accompanying drawings, in which:

Figure 1 shows a sectional view of a part of a printing press and a delivering mechanism applied thereto embodying my invention. This view also shows a number of Specification of Letters Patent.

Application filed July 24, 1911.

Patented Feb. 20, 1912.

Serial No. 640,225.

books in various positions within the delivering device. Fig. 2 shows a detail, sectional view on the line 22 of Fig. 1, and Fig. 3 shows a side elevation of a part of the printing press illustrating the gearing devices for operating my improved delivering device.

Referring to the accompanying drawings, I have used the reference numeral 10 to indicate the frame of that portion of the printing press in which the delivering mechanism is usually located. Within this frame is an endless conveyer 11 running over the rollers 12 and 13 and upon which the books are delivered after being printed, folded and stitched. The books are held to position in engagement with the conveyer 13 by a series of conveyer straps 14 supported on the rollers 15, 16, 17 and 18, whereby they are held in engagement with the upper portion of-the conveyer 11.

At the delivery end of the conveyer 11 are two sets of metal guide arms 19 and 20, which guide arms are fixed to suitable supports 21 and 22 and are so arranged that the books delivered from the conveyer 11 will pass straight downwardly between said guide arms, which guide arms are spaced apart from each other in the manner shown in Fig. 2.

Adjacent to the delivery ends of the guide arms 19 and 20 is a shaft 28 having a cross piece 2 1 fixed thereto, said cross piece being provided at each edge with a series of substantially convolute shaped delivering arms 5 and these arms are so shaped and positioned that asabook is dropped downwardlV between the guide arms 19 and 20 its lower edge will be caught within one of the sets of delivering arms and then the delivering arms carrying the books will move downwardly and toward the right, as shown in Fig. 1, thus slowly depositing the book upon the receiving conveyer hereinafter described and then withdrawing from engagement with the book so that the books thus delivered are arranged in substantially the manner illustrated by the numeral 26 in Fig. 1 on the receiving conveyer 27 which is of the ordinary construction and operates in the ordinary manner.

The mechanism before described or a slightly modified form of it is in general use on perfecting printing presses of the class first mentioned as being of the type that prints, folds and stitches two distinct books at the same time and delivers all of them to the receiving conveyer. In this connection it is obvious that considerable manual labor is required to take the completed books from the receiving conveyer and sepa rate the two different sets of books from each other.

By means of my improvement a very simple and inexpensive attachment may be made for printing presses which will operate to automatically separate the two sets of books. This attachment comprises a shaft 28 having on it a cross piece 29 and two sets of approximately convolute delivering arms 30 and 31 substantially similar to the delivering device before described except that the positions of the delivering arms 30 and 31 are reversed with respect to the delivering arms 25. The shaft 28 is so positioned that its delivering arms will project between the guide arms 19 and 20 in the manner illustrated in Fig- 2 and is also positioned above the shaft 23 and on the opposite side of the guide arms. In order that these two sets of delivering devices will not interfere with each other and will also operate in such a manner that one delivering device will receive one book from the conveyer 11 and the other delivering device will receive the next book, and so on, I have provided two gear wheels 32 and 33 fixed respectively to the shafts 23 and 28, which gear wheels are of the same size and are in mesh with each other, thus effecting a positive drive of the shaft 28 at the same speed of the shaft 23. By having two sets of delivering arms on each shaft so arranged that the sets of arms on the opposite shafts will alternately project into the path of the books between the guide arms, I have provided means whereby the alternate books delivered from the belt 11 will be engaged by the delivering arms first of the shaft 23 and then of the shaft 28.

I have found it desirable to deliver the books from both of the delivering devices to receiving conveyers in the same manner; that is to say, with the stitched edges of the books extending downwardly and resting on the conveyer, and in order to accomplish this desirable result, I have provided the following mechanism: The numeral 34 indicates a series of conveyer belts running over the pulleys 35 and 36, the latter pulleys being supported on independent arms 37. The delivering arms 30 run between the belts 34, as shown by dotted lines in Fig. 1. On the shaft 28 is a series of pulleys 38 and a another series of conveyer belts 39 is passed over the pulleys 38 and also around the pulleys 40, 41 and 35, said belts being so ar-- ranged that the books which are discharged into the delivering arms 31 will be carried by them to position where they will be engaged between the belts 34 and 39 and they will be carried upwardly by said belts around the pulleys 35 and then downwardly where they will be discharged between the pulleys and 40, in the manner shown in Fig. 1, upon the end of the receiving conveyer 42 and all of the books received by the conveyer 42 will be in position with the stitched edges thereof extended downwardly, as shown at 43 in Fig. 1. The various conveyer shafts are driven in the ordinary manner now in common use in printing presses of this class and it is therefore deemed unnecessary to specifically illustrate and describe said means.

One of the important features of my invention is that by arranging one of the shafts for the delivering arms above and on the side of the guide arms opposite from the other delivering shaft, I accomplish the following desirable results: First the alternate books are engaged by the delivering arms and one is placed upon the lower receiving conveyer and the other is placed upon a second receiving conveyer above the first; and furthermore by connecting the two shafts that are provided with delivering arms by means of gear wheels in mesh with each other, these shafts are always properly timed with relation toeach other. Therefore, assuming that the press is delivering alternate books of different kinds, it is obvious that these books will be separated and that each kind of books will be placed upon an independent receiving conveyer and kept separate from the other kind of books.

I am aware that heretofore various intricate and complicated mechanisms have been devised for directing alternate sheets of paper to different delivery points in a printing press and I am also aware that automatic switch devices have been provided for directing alternate sheets or books to different points of delivery.

The advantage of my invention is that in delivering books from printing presses some delivery device such, for instance, as the series of convolute arms herein shown, are necessary for properly placing the books upon an apron and one of the principal advantages of my invention is that I have so constructed and arranged the two sets of convolute delivering arms as to dispense with all necessity for an extra or independent mechanism for separating the alternate books, and I have utilized these two delivering devices which are essential to a delivery mechanism of this class so that these two delivering devices themselves, without extra switch mechanisms, perform the function of delivering alternate books to independent receiving aprons.

I claim as my invention:

1. In a delivering device of the class described, the combination of a shaft, a series of substantially convolute arms carried by said shaft and designed to receive and deliver books, a second shaft arranged above the first and at one side thereof, a set of substantially convolute arms carried by the second shaft and arranged to receive and deliver books, guide devices arranged to form a single guide way and designed to convey books to both of said sets of convolute arms, the convolute arms on both shafts being arranged to extend across the guide way, during certain parts of their movement, means for gearing said shafts together so that the arms of said shafts will alternately project across the guide way and engage books passing through the guide way, and a delivering apron for each of said sets of convolute arms in position to receive books therefrom.

H 2. In a device of the class described, the combination of a set of downwardly extended guide arms, a second set of downwardly extended guide arms spaced apart from the first to form a guide-way between them, the length of the second set of guide arms being materially less than the length of the first set, a delivering device comprising a shaft and a series of substantially convolute arms thereon arranged in position to receive books passing through said guideway, a receiving apron arranged to receive the books from the said delivering device, a second delivering device comprising a shaft and substantially convolute arms, said second delivering device being arranged above the first and on the side of the guide-way opposite from the first, the arms thereof being designed to receive books from said guide-way, and a second delivering apron in position to receive books from the second delivering device, said parts being so arranged that alternate books passing through said guide-way will be engaged and delivered one to the lower delivering apron and the next to the upper delivering apron, for the purposes stated.

Des Moines, Iowa, June 30, 1911.

JAMES M. PIERCE.

Witnesses:

THOMAS E. Cox, J. A. BEARD.

Copies of this patent may be obtained for five cents each, by addressing the Commissioner of Patents, Washington, I). G. 

